April

“Help me, God,” he muttered under his breath as he wiped his clean-shaven face with large hands. Eddie knew he hadn’t lost his mind. Hadn’t the county shrink declared him fit to stand trial? Branded with a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder, Eddie had languished in lockup since last year, awaiting trial. He had also, inexplicably to him, been declared a flight risk, when in fact he had no money, not even a car. He couldn’t make bail. When he was a young teen, he had spent time in juvenile detention for such offenses as panhandling, wandering around without proper ID, trespassing, and the like. But this was so different. It was, his lawyer had told him, deadly serious. He may have ASPD, but still he would face the music for his most serious alleged misdeed yet: rape.

Her name was April. She was beautiful, with long, supple, athletic legs and blond tresses that spilled down past her shoulders and ample breasts. She had a bronzed, radiant complexion from basking under the Georgia sun for all the world to see. Eddie had spied her clandestinely many times but had been afraid to approach her. She lived four houses down from him, in a large, two story home that was painted dark blue and was known throughout the neighborhood as the Blue House. Her parents were attorneys or something, and away a lot.

Eddie wasn’t clever with words and didn’t know how to be cool with a woman the way his friends could. In her yard, April wore a string bikini that showed darn near everything, almost revealing her private parts. This made Eddie uncomfortable at first, but he overcame his discomfort as he got to know her. Unlike most people he knew, April talked to him, not at him, and asked him about his life and what he liked to do when he wasn’t working at the restaurant where she also worked. So at first he made stuff up to make himself sound more interesting. He liked to skydive and hunt bears in the wild, he told her. She told him she didn’t like guns or hunting, and he told her he wouldn’t do it anymore. As he grew to know her better, Eddie came clean and told April that he didn’t know how to skydive and didn’t even own a gun, much less hunt.

“I knew you were fibbing, Eddie,” she said with that laugh that sounded like ice tinkling in a glass. April wore pale pink lipstick on her rosebud lips. Eddie loved her lips and longed to kiss them. He’d never kissed a woman other than Aunt Trudy, with whom he lived. April might have thought there was something wrong with him because he didn’t really know how to kiss, but no. She was patient with him; she showed him how to pucker his lips, lean into the kiss, and relax.

“Put your arms around me, Eddie. Put your hands on my hips; that’s right.”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he protested. She laughed, but not at him.

“I’m not made of glass,” she told him. He took a great breath. He instinctively trusted her. Unlike a lot of the people Eddie had met, April hadn’t a mean bone in her body. Other people called him retard or stupid, and made him feel ashamed. She liked Eddie; he could tell. And he was soon crazy in love with her. They began to spend long hours together when they weren’t working and when April wasn’t in school. She told Eddie that she worked hard at her studies.

“I don’t want to work in a restaurant my whole life,” she said. Neither did Eddie, but he’d worked there for ten years, since he was sixteen, and had dropped out of the special school; he didn’t know what else he might do. April encouraged him to become a student like her, but he didn’t know. He’d never been that bright in school. Always self-effacing, he repeatedly put himself down.

“You’re not stupid!” she told him pointedly, almost losing her temper.

“But you study calculus. I can barely do fractions,” he replied honestly.

“Go to the library and get a book on math, and we’ll work on it together,” she insisted. “I’ll prove you’re smart.” So he did, and it worked out beautifully. Before he knew it, she was teaching him algebra. Eventually, Eddie’s feelings towards April began to evolve; he became more focused on her, more possessive, and more committed. He discovered, to his surprise, that he wanted a life with this wonderful woman. Best of all, she seemed to feel the same way.

“Oh, Eddie, I can’t wait to make love to you,” she said unexpectedly one day after work. They were alone in her bedroom at the Blue House and, following her shower, she wore nothing but a thin robe, green like her eyes, Eddie flushed, embarrassed but in the same frame of mind. Eddie, of course, had never made love to anyone. What if he couldn’t do it? he wondered. All those ads on TV about ED and everything. Maybe, he thought, he should get some pills, but he’d be too embarrassed to ask for them. What if he let April down? He wouldn’t be able to live with himself. He’d have to quit his job at the restaurant and hide away in shame. He began to hyperventilate. April touched his arm. Her hand felt warm.

“I think you’d make a wonderful lover, Eddie,” she told him. She looked straight into his eyes, and again, he believed her.

“Have you ever…” he began.

She smiled. “Of course,” she said gently. He stared at her in awe. “Eddie, I’ll teach you everything I know. “It’ll be like the fractions,” she said lightly. “Only more fun.” Whatever April told him, Eddie believed.

During his time in jail, men had approached him and wanted to have sex with him, but Eddie was a large man and very strong. So far, they had kept their distance. Most of the time he was kept in solitary because of the seething hatred the other inmates had for rapists. How were they any better? he wondered. In lockup, Eddie wasn’t called by his name but rather “chomo,” whatever that was supposed to mean.

Finally, one afternoon, they did it—they made love in April’s bed. Eddie had been afraid to reveal his body, feeling self-conscious about his appearance, but April was impressed with his physique.

“Ooh, Eddie, you have a fantastic body,” said April with a delighted squeal, running her hand down his chest. Eddie had lifted weights for ten years because he liked to be strong, but he had never thought much about how he looked. He smiled. April was a skilled lover, thought Eddie. She knew just what to do; she never hurried him, and their bodies melded into one. She was like a force of nature. This was but the first of many times.

It all came to a tragic end one day when Eliza, a friend of April’s, entered the Blue House uninvited and stole up the stairs to April’s bedroom. There she spotted the two lovers, wrapped in each other’s arms and fast asleep. Soon, a tender secret became town gossip and then common knowledge. April’s parents were stunned. Authorities were summoned, an arrest made and charges filed.. Eddie, impoverished, was accorded only a public defender.

So Eddie had spent the ensuing nine months locked away in jail, awaiting trial, his aunt and his attorney his only visitors. He stood in his cell, his large, powerful fists rigidly gripping the bars. He hadn’t known that what he was doing was wrong. To him it had been about love. His mind drifted back to April; the worst part of his incarceration was his isolation from the woman that he adored. Just two days from now, he knew, would be April’s birthday; she would then turn seventeen. Eddie had never before even heard of statutory rape.

…

A Letter to My Favorite Drug

Accustomed to ending the day on a high note

In the most artificial way possible,

Rising up out of my body

Through elevated corporal cravings.

But sometimes you show up and disrupt

My habitual rituals of obituary-courting,

Your sheer presence rendering me euphoric

Before you’ve spoken a single word.

Yes, the freedom to converse through silence

Is a most precious one indeed,

Raising and lowering my blood pressure

With simultaneous tenderness.

Three hours seem like one

Which of course is not enough

To savor the indispensably insignificant details,

The essential nonessentials.

Go to bed later, wake up earlier,

Energized by our low-energy synergy

And wishing I could imbibe your magic potion

Every day of the week.

The Silence In Between

Woke up at 1 AM

To a cacophony of moans

Almost shattering the window

With operatic decibels.

Good for them,

Bad for me

Still barely fresh

From a pre-sleep fantasy.

Calculated their level of closeness

By listening for the silence in between,

The vulnerable moment

When the script turns into improv.

Shower came on quick enough;

Must have been successful

And a little bit stressful

Remembering each other’s names.

Then a sequel session

Shook the walls once more

But I stopped keeping score

Certain it would end with a closed door.

Nearby Farness

Hoodie to the left, hoodie to the right,

Shields against peripheral vision

So that beauty stays a question mark

Instead of a period.

Better to be trusted than loved

Although it’s nice if you can be both,

Blessed with distant proximity

And nearby farness.

Crumbs of conversation

Scattered in an imaginary forest

Where people require other people

To find their way back home.

Some get their kicks on what-if situations,

Taking communion at the Church of Friday Night

In which bartenders consecrate a glass of California wine

While choirs sing “Sweet Caroline” with no-strings-attached ecstasy.

Others brand themselves as stubborn dreamers

Refusing to search for what refuses to approach them

Without considering the possibility

They’re too well-hidden to be found.

Hoodie up above, hoodie down below,

Angels and mortals locked in a staring contest

Destined to continue for eternity

Since they’re both afraid of flashing their eyes.

Showed Promise

Stumbled across the obituary at precisely 12:00,

The usual time for mid-year New Year’s resolutions

As the drunkenness turns to queasiness

And the pleasure starts to sting.

26 and two days counting;

Didn’t even have the glory of 27,

Just a halfway thought-out header

That read, “Showed Promise.”

Showed promise for what exactly?

Capitalistic success?

Perhaps a Wikipedia page

Or picture on a restaurant wall?

Anyhow, it didn’t matter;

Whatever promise was shown had faded

Unless there was an accompanying suicide note

To inspire posthumous adulation.

Wandered to the cemetery the next morning,

Paid respects from a stranger

Which are sometimes sincerer

Than the rehearsed well-wishes of a friend.

Assured him he was more

Than what he had not yet become

And that what he already was

Was all he ever needed to be.

Big Sister

The tiny head had been there for more than an hour

And would likely remain until the train stopped,

Ejecting them both onto a crowded platform

Full of 9-to-5 fighters and 5-to-9 nurturers.

She of course belonged to the latter group,

An invisible angel seen as just another tired face

Accustomed to questions and quests for answers

That even her parents couldn’t fulfill.

Tried to hide the number of times she cried in a day,

Microchipping Kleenex into her eyes

But was frequently met by the sudden surprise

Of an old lady staring sympathetically.

No sympathy was required though,

No hand-me-down advice;

The source of her fragility

Was also the source of her strength.

Which didn’t stop her from doubting

The legitimacy of that tiny head

Gracing her shoulders with trust

She feared she couldn’t live up to.

THE DANA

The Dana has arrived riding a donkey

Called Climate Change

Kicking and whipping with its tail

Valencia, Albacete, Malaga 

And some of La Mancha

Disrupting the mountains and hills

Tearing down the thickest trees

Piling cars on top of each other

Knocking over holes, swamps

Bridges, houses and many lives

Of children, young people and old

That none of their gods have saved.

The earth trembles

The sky trembles

Coming to touch its head

Against the terrified ground.

Nobody asked for help

Because the Dana gave them death as a hat.

Two or three days later

Furious jealous people 

From different governments and colour

With their king and queen as scarecrows

Who get along like an ass

They came well mounted on their donkeys

Looking brave and bizarre

Without taking a shovel or brush 

Or getting down into the mud.

They walked hesitantly over the mud

Receiving from the suffering people

Spit and mud balls

And sticks from some madmen

Adorning the face of the queen with more mud.

The people go to throw them from there

Who hesitate so that the moment

Will not be more painful and bloody.

The rulers and kings

Gave some lying braying

Which made the Congress and the Senate hesitate

Who at that moment were touching their balls

Engaged as always in insults

And donkey grunts

Giving thanks for their luck

To the coffers and urns of the people.

The Dana took two hundred and some heads

Leaving some forgotten

Only the noble people showed courage

From all the towns

And from the beloved and armed organizations

Who have nothing to do

With the de facto governments.

Now, traces and relics remain of them

Of those who lie on the ground and disappeared

So remembered.

-And to whom is it all due?

The old men and women ask themselves, sadly.

Answering the nebulous atmosphere

Of Climate Change:

-To the Donkeys who rule you by braying.

An Expected End

He’s uninstalled 

The Tinder app

From his phone,

His journey

On a road to nowhere

Has come to 

Its expected end.

Taylor Dibbert is a poet in Washington, DC. He’s author of, most recently, “Takoma.”

I WEAR YOUR NET

Empires live by iron and corn

and die in marble and famine.

You brought the starvation and war

that harbingered this, my ruin.

I cannot take my rightful throne;

you hold robe and crown and scepter.

All of my ghosts are made of stone.

I’m the quarry, you’re the sculptor.

When someone asks me why I wear

your net? I thought it my ladder.

I aspire into stratosphere

but you keep me in your cellar.

My voice and my vision are lost

among your parrots and mirrors.

You use your dust and mist and rust

to confuse merit with error.

SOME HORIZON

A poet sits next to G. B. Shaw, unopened.

Poet has no mind to drive his pen.

A momentary rickshaw draws from the mist

but is swallowed back in fog with a stumble and list.

Flirtatious Alpha Centauri beckons to the telescopes

but poet’s flaccid astronomer fails to focus.

All the usual muses are asleep,

the whiskey and the mistresses, strangers in the street;

neither the etchings on the walls nor the scrimshaw on the shelf

volunteer to help.

Empty poet begs along the Word,

laments poetry’s place as kickshaw at the smorgasbord.

And then — poet imagines

Humanity in its dungeon —

unbathed – hungry as a blight —

encaged in rags — in a hint of sunlight —

a detested defiled diseased

tenement for generations of fleas —

the cell’s metal, complicit embrace of laxity —

a skeletal thread against a mildew tapestry —

cornucopia of hopeless hope

that even a poor pen surpasses the sturdy rope,

that any desperate continuing

improves on the endless end,

–that hacksaws and pardons

may exist on some horizon,

dandelion the shackles,

and be lion to jackals.

ERGONOMICS

Sitting aside the curb a=nursing coffee and croissants, I can’t help but marvel at couples passing by. Nearly every boy is just-high enough that her head lies snugly in the fit between his face and shoulder. And this inexorably leads me to reminisce about baseballs, how they used to lodge so comfortably in my fingers’ arc, precisely like the exact hyperbole of your remembered breast.

FRENCH KISS, 1789

A girl like a powdered queen.

Man massive and lean.

A love like a guillotine.

As mundane, as keen.

BLACKENING FACTORY

Magpies harangue

jewelled peacocks

to picket the sky.

The river smiles

below

the pier.

The machinery of sex

processes

our progeny.

Silent silver moonface

ticks

toward overtime.

Dusk goes dark goes dawn goes day goes dusk.

The highway

prays toward

E N dl es ss s::

perspective. Every exit

becomes

just

another

road